Psychosocial interventions at the workplace, a systematic literature review

Abstract

Abstract The psychosocial work environment has been shown to be of importance for the health and wellbeing of individuals as well as for the productivity, sickness absence levels, and wellbeing of an organization. The aim was to map the existing knowledge, as presented in relevant and well performed systematic reviews, that have investigated the effects of work-related interventions, aiming to affect the psychosocial work environment and health related outcomes in workers/employees and in organizations. A systematic literature review of published systematic literature reviews was performed to map the knowledge on psychosocial interventions at the workplace. The search was performed in three electronic databases: PubMed, PsycINFO, and Cinahl. A total of 44 systematic literature reviews, of moderate or good quality, about studies on effects of workplace-related psychosocial interventions on health-related outcomes of the employees or the organization, were included. The types of interventions that were carried out mainly concerned different forms of stress-reducing or stress-management programs, or different forms of health-promotion either aimed specifically for mental ill-health or more general. Interventions aimed at bullying, social support, work efficiency and psychosocial climate in the workplace were also identified. The vast majority of outcomes were related to mental or general health. The majority of the systematic literature reviews reported several different outcome measures. A large proportion of the systematic literature reviews included interventions aimed at a general group of 'workers', or healthcare personnel. A substantial amount of research regarding effects of psychosocial workplace interventions, have been published to date. Much of the existing knowledge indicates that the psychosocial work environment affects the individual and that active workplace interventions may promote health for the individual as well as the organization. Key messages A substantial amount of research regarding effects of psychosocial workplace interventions, have been published to date. Active psychosocial workplace interventions can have beneficial effects for the levels of sickness absence both for individuals and organizations.